My friend and fellow artist Bruce Russell, who has died aged 76, was one of the most original and admired abstract artists of the 1970s and 80s. His paintings will be remembered for their startling vivacity, their verve, their jazzed-up cubism. In 1977 he wrote that he loved “chemical, candy, culinary, ‘untastefully’ synthetic colours, in dissonant combination with earth pigments”. He sourced his motifs from “vorticism, Bauhaus, Art Deco, those interestingly awful ‘contemporary’ fabrics and furnishing of the 50s”. When viewing his paintings in a small Putney studio in the mid-70s, I remember thinking of those Fablon kitchen patterns, the aluminium greys of hi-fi sets, and random logos shuttling about in a dance - Foxtrot was one 1978 title. I was really impressed.
From the 70s onwards Bruce had a number of solo exhibitions in London and New York, including at the Hoya gallery, AIR, Ian Birksted, Benjamin Rhodes and the New York Studio School, with his last exhibitions at the Beardsmore Gallery. His paintings were acquired by public collections. He was an early contributor to the artist-run magazine Artscribe. In 1979 his paintings were featured in the key survey of the time, the Hayward Annual (alongside works by Bill Henderson, Gary Wragg, Jennifer Durrant and me).
